By The Numbers - RD18, (2017)

Subiaco made it 15 in a row with a hard fought 46-point win over Peel built on a foundation of stout defence.

This is the third time the Lions have beaten the Thunder since last year’s Grand final. These are some of the other numbers from Saturday’s win

0 – RYAN: Liam Ryan had no handballs in Saturday’s game against Peel. Interestingly all three times that Ryan has failed to have a handball in a game, he has kicked four goals.

3 – KITCHIN: Before Saturday’s game, Leigh Kitchin had an incredible record of 17 single goals across his 58 games. Never before had he kicked more than 1 in a game. Saturday was a bit of an offensive explosion for Kitchin as he tripled his career high with 3 goals.

8 – DEFENCE: For a team that prides itself on defence, Saturday’s win over the WAFL’s current stingiest defence was significant. Following Saturday Subiaco (1038) has the second best defence by points against, now just 8 points behind Peel (1030) who remain the WAFL’s least scored against team.

10 – SCORING SHOTS: Another hallmark defensive performance was indicated by Peel having just 10 scoring shots for the game. That is the lowest number of shots conceded by Subiaco this season, and lowest since Round 19, 2016 when Swans could only muster 5.4 against the Lions.

14 – HEAL: Aaron Heal smashed his career mark for most marks in Saturday’s game with 14, many of them crucial intercept grabs. Before Saturday, Heal’s career high in marks was 8 set against Claremont in 2016.

15 – 3QT LEADS: Well known is that Subiaco has won 15 games in a row. Less known is that the Lions have also never trailed at three quarter time during that 15 game win streak.

24 – LOCKYER: Like his running buddy in the backline Aaron Heal, it was a career day for Jordan Lockyer as he equalled a career high with 24 possessions. The last time he had 24, came back in 2015 against East Perth.

39.33 – DEFENSIVE 50 CONVERSION: In their past four games since their last bye, Subiaco has given up 59 scoring shots from 150 inside 50 entries for a defensive inside 50 conversion rate of 39.33%. The WAFL average is 47% and indicates the ongoing improvement defensively of the Lions.

51.43 – INSIDE 50 CONVERSION: Over the same time, Subiaco has also seen an improvement in their own inside 50 conversion, by converting 51.43% of the times they went inside fifty over the past month, 108 scores from 210 entries. For the season Subiaco is converting at 49.30%.

64.88 – AVERAGE POINTS AGAINST: Capping off the defensive theme, for the first time this year Subiaco’s points against average sits below 65. This sits favourably with 2016 when the defensive mark was 63.55 points against per game.

312 – DELAHUNTY: With another 23 possessions at the weekend, Lachlan Delahunty for the first time passed 300 possessions in a WAFL season. In his first three WAFL seasons he had returns of 262, 287 and 268. He is the third Lion to pass 300 this season with Leigh Kitchin on 407 and Kyal Horsley on 398. Max Walters is within striking distance of the 300 club for the first time, currently on 297 possessions.